Chapter 588: Their respective problems and gains (2 in 1)

“I don’t remember an invitation being extended, the Magic Rune Club’s activities are suspended because of-” Felix looked at them. Luna nodded and said, “Participation in the trial.” “Yeah, that’s why.” He said.

“I saw the picture in the newspaper – Professor Dumbledore, Ms. Bones, and you.” Luna said with great interest, “Dad mentioned in Quibbler that you are one of the three most powerful wizard in the world.”

“I saw that article too, it was very amusing.” Felix said with a poker face, “Especially the bit that envisaged us joining forces against the wizarding world.”

He turned his head and looked at the others – they looked at each other, averted their gaze, and hesitant to speak.

“Well, come and sit down, all of you.” He used his magic to conjure up a couple of soft chairs, at which point Fred and George at the desk stopped, and ran out of the spell’s reach, standing on the edge of the desk eyeing the situation while waving their arms for attention, “Hey, someone – we can’t get down by ourselves! ”

“Let me do it!” Ron called out, as if afraid someone else would grab this chance from him, and only when he had finished speaking did he look at Felix, “Um – is that okay?”

Before Felix’s head could nod down completely, he rushed over to the desk, bent over to look at his two brothers, and said in a gloating tone, “Look what I found, flower fairies who lost their wings? I’ve never seen a flower fairy so big and fit …”

“Come on up, brats.” He held out his hand with a wide smile.

Fred and George subconsciously took a step back, they didn’t have the upper hand at the moment. But there was no room for compromise, Fred tilted his head and stared carefully at Ron’s face, “From this angle, your face looks like a disaster scene, pockmarked-”

“Those are freckles! You two have them too!” Ron exclaimed irritably, as he grabbed his two brothers and shook them in his hands, “I haven’t settled the score with you yet, for that punching telescope -”

He gave them a warning look and led them over to the couch in the office, and threw them smoothly onto the couch before sitting down. Fred and George screamed and avoided Ron’s body as he slowly sat down. The two crawled up and down, and eventually leaned back against the arm of the couch, patting their chests heartily.

“That was a close call, almost got murdered by my own brother-”

” – Just the thought of being crushed to death by his arse, to be honest, would have killed me.”

Harry looked squintingly at the two men, who seemed to be having a good time.

“So -” Felix watched this interaction between relatives with interest as the rest of them stifled their laughter, then he sat down on the single sofa and asked, “What sort of coincidence brought you together? Potter?”

“Er, Professor, Colin saw – saw -” Harry trailed off, staring at Felix’s pocket and then at the twins who are still jostling at the couch, unsure of how to describe it.

Is he supposed to say that Colin Creevey saw the image of the Professor bouncing up the stairs while pressing Fred, who was poking his head out of his pocket, back in? That would be too weird.

“I see what you mean, that’s what all three of you have in mind?” Felix looked at Harry, Ron, and Hermione, the trio nodded in unison and Felix turned to the others. They rattled off their words.

“I had some study queries,” Cedric said, pulling a notebook out of his pocket, “I tried to write a book like this, in imitation of a magic rune booklet, but it always seemed a bit vague.”

“Cho is accompanying me here.” He gestured to Cho Chang, who’s seated quietly at one side.

Felix nodded his head in approval, then averted his gaze slightly.

“I’m not doing anything, just stopped by.” Draco slowly mumbled.

“I do have something to ask you, some questions regarding the academy …” Felix said vaguely, “Stay behind for a while.”

Draco nodded hesitantly.

Finally, it was the Greengrass sister’s turn, Daphne hesitated to speak, when her sister reached out and pointed at Draco, “We followed him, he’s been so alone and secretive lately, we wondered what he was doing.”

Draco gave her a stern look.

That caught Harry’s attention, and he stared at Draco’s face as if trying to see something, he thought about the recent rumours about the ‘Malfoy Family Head turning against the Death Eaters’ and guessed that the Malfoy who is in the midst of the rumours got quite affected.

Only Neville, Luna, and Ginny remained, and Felix looked at Neville.

“I, er,” Neville opened his mouth nervously, seemingly uncomfortable with so many people around him, causing Felix to think he was about to say something embarrassing, so he said tentatively, ” We can talk alone – ”

“No, no,” Neville said, “I’d like to ask about-” he paused, “Potions. ”

“Potions?” Felix asked in surprise.

Even the others looked at Neville strangely, which caused the flush on Neville’s face to increase as he swallowed and said, “The school distributed pamphlets on various careers over the holidays, and I saw that Auror’s leaflet demanded that applicants should have at least five N.E.W.Ts certificates, with no grade lower than ‘E’ in each subject –”

Harry and Ron drew in a soft breath, they had long identified themselves with the Auror job, but they didn’t give it much of a thought and just assumed they would just wait for the start of the school year to speak to Professor McGonagall and listen to her advice.

“-and a whole series of rigorous personality and intelligence tests prepared by the Auror’s office.”

Harry and Ron’s faces turned pale as Neville finished his sentence, which appeared comparable to Draco’s skin tone.

“Oh, I see.” Felix smirked, “You were told that you had to get a certificate in Potions class to enrol for Auror and were worried that you wouldn’t be able to meet the requirements and had no idea how to proceed further …” Neville nodded.

“No wonder, many students who want to enrol for Auror have gotten stuck on the Potions hurdle, who asked Professor Snape’s Advanced Class to only accept students who take outstanding in O.W.Ls exams.” Felix said, looking slightly amused.

” Requires a Potions class certificate?” Harry asked, in bewilderment.

“And get an Outstanding?!” Ron shouted in despair.

The two men looked bloodless by now – in their minds, getting ‘Outstanding’ in the Potions exam would be a miracle.

Harry felt his heart shatter like glass along with the dream of becoming an Auror.

“To be a good Auror, you at least need to understand how to detoxify the poison, right?” Felix said, sort of explaining the problem the two had, “Of course, the reality is much more complicated.”

He thought about it and said to Neville, “If it’s just a matter of simply improving your grades, that is, getting high marks,” he looked uncertainly at Neville, who nodded repeatedly, and smiled, “there’s a way to do that, so wait a minute, and we can talk about that.”

“Professor?” Harry asked anxiously, “Can we stay and listen together?”

“Yes Professor, we’re wondering the same thing as Neville,” Ron said busily, “as long as we can get high marks.”

“Professor Snape wouldn’t be happy about that,” Felix shook his head, looking amused at what he seemed to have thought of. “Still, there’s no reason for him to reject some kind of little trick. Unless he wants to deny himself …” his last words were low and inaudible.

Felix’s eyes darted between Luna and Ginny before his gaze eventually settled on Ginny. This time he guessed wrong, Ginny nudged Luna with her hand who was staring straight at Fred and George. “Oh,” Luna sobered up, “I have something to tell you.” She said seriously.

” What’s it about?” Felix asked.

“Have you ever read The Tales of Beedle the Bard Storybook?” Luna asked, her eyes suddenly became very bright, unlike her usual dazed appearance. “There’s a ‘The Tale of the Three Brothers’ in there that mentions Death and his three creations-”

Harry, Ron, and Hermione exchanged cautious glances.

“I know what you’re going to say.” Felix interrupted her and Luna blinked, a little puzzled, but she didn’t press on, instead, she looked at him expectantly, which gave Felix a huge headache.

Trouble seemed to be catching up with him, and he hadn’t expected Luna to bring up this part of the story. Where did she find out about it again?

“The rumours about me possessing the Elder Wand were false, and I think I’ve proved it.” Felix said briefly. The cost of a dozen lives, and an open battle with Voldemort, made all the hidden covetousness to fade away.

Of course, it hadn’t disappeared all at once, Felix had spent the next few months rummaging through the Marauder’s map when he had nothing better to do, and redeemed bounties on people who were suspiciously moving around.

“I’m talking about the other thing,” Luna said softly, “the Resurrection Stone.”

Felix frowned.

“Miss Lovegood-”

“I performed divination with Firenze,” Luna said quickly as she looked at him, “and he said from the results that what I longed for seemed close – close enough to pass by.”

Felix was silent for a moment, What was it? The resurrection stone? Did she mean the Resurrection Stone was in the school?

It couldn’t be in one of her roommate’s book bag, could it?

And he reckoned that Firenze might not have meant ‘Pass by’ in the same way that Luna understood it …

“Okay.” He said, “You guys have really brought me many surprises.” He stood up and looked around. “That’s a lot of questions, let’s tackle them one by one. It just so happens that I have something I need your help with too. Luna, you come here first.”

He and Luna walked to the other end of the office and talked quietly about it.

The result of the talk surprised him a little; for the first time, he had heard about the Deathly Hallows, the legend in which the three creations of death that are mentioned in fairy tales are brought together and treated as one. And it had a special significance – that is, mastering the three sacred artefacts would make you the Master of Death.

All that Felix knew about them was that the Elder Wand is real and right now it is wielded by Dumbledore.

“Have you ever considered that it is merely an Aphorism-like legend? That even if they were real, they might just simply be three powerful magical artefacts that have been interspersed and forcefully linked together by later generations?”

But Luna offered a basis for the truth.

“The Elder Wand.” Luna drew a vertical line in his hand. “The resurrection stone.” She added a circle under the vertical line. ” The Invisibility Cloak.” She finally drew a triangle outside the vertical line which wrapped the first two together to form a complete and elaborate pattern.

Felix stared at his hand, which, if he had read it correctly, seemed to be the logo of another person?

Just like his Ouroboros, at one point it was synonymous with the man.

“Grindelwald?” He asked gently.

“You know him too?” Luna asked curiously, “Papa said that this symbol was indeed misunderstood by many, but the truth is that it did not belong to him, Grindelwald only borrowed it, and its true originators were the three Peverell brothers.”

“The three Peverell … brothers? Three brothers?”

“Antioch, Cadmus, and Ignotus, who were the original possessors of the Deathly Hallows.” Luna said with great certainty, but Felix reckoned she was just paraphrasing her father, ” This symbol is still on the tombstone of Ignotus, in the Godric’s Hollow. Papa took me to see it. It’s the coat of arms of the Peverell family.”

Felix bowed his head and seemed to be talking to himself.

“So, whoever knows the symbol should also know the meaning behind it?”

On the other end, the few people sitting on the couch couldn’t help but look repeatedly at Professor and Luna, who had been talking for a long time, but they were too far away for them to listen, or maybe it could have been a spell. “The Professor is so kind.” Cho Chang said, she clearly dismissed the whole thing as a responsible professor guiding a young girl with a brain full of fantasies.

“But who is Firenze?” She asked.

“A Centaur.” Harry said.

“So it’s not something she imagined?” Cho Chang asked with interest, looking at Luna in the distance, thoughtfully, “I’m two years apart from her, but I still heard of her nickname – Loony, you know?”

“She’s not crazy,” Ginny said coldly, “just a bit -”

“Weird in a weird way.” Ron nodded sagely. Ginny glared at him.

“Oh,” Cho Chang said apologetically, “you guys are friends?”

At that moment, Luna had returned bouncing, with her fluffy hair bouncing together. “How was the chat?” Ginny asked, hoping her friend would dispel the unrealistic fantasy that the dead could come back to life and stuff … It sounded too good to be true.

“The professor promised to keep an eye out for me and if he ever finds one he will lend it to me.” She said cheerfully.

“Diggory-” Felix called out from the other end as Cedric stood up and walked over to him with his own notes. Felix flipped through them roughly, going over them quickly in his head, and said to him, “It’s pretty decent already, with a lot of details I hadn’t considered, I can see you’ve put a lot of effort into it.”

Cedric smiled bashfully.

“I assume you’ve also submitted an article to ‘New Solutions to Rune’ Magazine, right?”

Cedric nodded.

” It was already mailed out.”

“I’ll keep this note for now, I need to look it over carefully and a little later we can discuss it …”

Then Felix waved at Draco who approached him reluctantly.

“Tell me, what you think.” Felix asked, looking in the direction of the couch from which the Greengrass sisters are looking over. “Your classmates can see that you aren’t quite yourself lately, and as I told you before, you can come to me if you can’t cope up with it.”

“They’re nosy,” Draco said in annoyance, “especially the little one, blaming me for ruining her ghost food.”

Felix casually asked a few questions about what had happened, to roughly summarize, that Astoria had gotten a portion of ghost food from somewhere. It is actually quite rare and difficult to preserve, only available in Classroom Seven, and he gave some to Valen –

He turned his head to stare at Valen, and well, he seemed to know where Astoria had gotten the ghost food from.

The drama that followed was Astoria bringing it out to show off, only to have it inadvertently knocked down by Draco. “I was playing a losing game and was completely oblivious to her jumping behind me.” Draco defended himself.

“So what’s wrong lately?”

A flush spread across Draco’s face. Felix was very experienced at this, “I promise not to say anything.” With that Draco pulled an elaborate, ornate, and detailed coat of arms out of his pocket.

When Felix saw the letter ‘M’ on it, he guessed more or less.

“The family crest of the Malfoy family?”

Draco nodded, “It was enclosed in the letter my mother sent.” It became clear in Felix’s mind that it was the same letter he had helped deliver.

“So they dropped the responsibility on you?” Felix asked with a smile, “Any luck?”

“A little,” Draco swallowed, sizing him up carefully, “Professor, are you going to forcibly break the Statute of Secrecy when the war is over?”

Felix scratched his head a bit, “You’re all giving me so many surprises today one by one – who told you that?” Well, it should be a rumour, he had even teased Grindelwald about it personally.

“No?” Draco seemed very disappointed hearing that, and when he saw the professor raise his eyebrow, he hurriedly said, “It was my own guess. Professor, I’m sure you’ve heard of my grandfather, Abraxas Malfoy?” He asked with an expectant look on his face.

“I have heard of him.”

“He died when I was a little boy, and I recently recalled his words,” Draco swallowed, ” he said, that everyone has their own place in this world, and the only difference is that the place/position of the strong is not called a place, but a mission or destiny.”

“Oh?” Felix said in an uncertain manner.

“I thought I could help out if that is your intention.” Draco stammered, “You told me before that my wand is suitable for medical magic, plus I’ve been looking up information on this recently after the start of the academic year … for career advice.”

Felix had only one thought at the moment, Lucius can retire pretty soon.

As it turned out, Draco wasn’t trying to become a healer, but hit on the idea of a possible ´United Muggle-Wizard Hospital´, and even though his idea wasn’t perfect, it was enough to surprise Felix.

“Your idea … is a little ahead of the time, and I can’t give you a definitive answer. After all, it’s hard to say what the future holds, but you could certainly work towards that, by following your idea to become at least a good healer first. You have a lot to learn.”

Draco returned to his place on the couch and sat down as Neville, Harry, and Ron approached, Hermione thought for a moment and also followed.

The three boys eyed him, eager for the ‘way to get high marks’ as he put it, and as for Hermione, she strongly resented playing tricks, but she came over anyway to find out what it was about.

‘I’m just trying to get information.’ Hermione told herself.

Without further ado, Felix told them to wait here for a little while and took a set of Potions textbooks out of his bedroom.

He stroked the covers with affection, “They’ve helped me a lot.”

“Are these your Potions textbooks from school?” Harry guessed.

“Ah, how can I put it? You guys don’t think I could afford a new textbook when I was at school, do you?” Felix said, “The school’s financial support fund was very limited at the time and one had to be careful with money, I could only afford second-hand books and old robes, but what’s the saying, ‘If you think about everything one step further, you can be better than you are now.'”

“It wasn’t long after school started that I discovered the school had a storage cupboard that’s dedicated to store used textbooks and I spent a bit of time picking out the best of the best – I can’t believe how some of them were near new with just a single name on them.”

Harry stared down at the set of textbooks in the professor’s hand, torn and tattered, edges flying, seemingly having suffered terrible abuse.

“… It does not include this Potions textbook. This set was handpicked by me, and you will find that it is wonderful beyond its appearance.”

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